The mountain air was damp.
When Song Chen landed on his feet, the soil beneath them was far too soft.
He glanced down. The soil was black tinged with red, with very little grass. Only a few clumps of grayish-white shrubs poked out of cracks in the ground.
Even the trees in the distance looked nothing like trees. Their trunks and branches were dark red and smooth, without bark or leaves. Only small, round red fruits hung from their tips.
Those fruits contracted slightly at regular intervals, like hearts.
Song Chen walked slowly along the foot of the mountain, his Psychic Energy perception fully extended.
The entire valley lay within his perception. There were many people here, but they were all quiet.
He saw people bent over on a distant slope, pulling something out of the ground. It was a pale white grass that grew from the blood-red soil, long and thin, looking rather like dead people's fingers.
Blood-Eclipse Clan guards watched over those people. Song Chen counted at least several hundred natives on that slope and only one guard, yet no one spoke. They did not even dare lift their heads.
The entire slope was silent except for the wind and the occasional footstep, a deathly stillness born of prolonged oppression.
Song Chen kept walking.
He saw a hard-packed path leading from the valley to the distant Flesh Station.
The path was deep red. Many wooden stakes stood along both sides, with things hanging from them.
Song Chen did not look closely. One glance was enough. He knew what those things were.
For the people here, life had never been whole.
Coming out to see it really is nothing like sitting inside a spaceship.
Song Chen thought to himself.
He hid behind a pile of broken rocks and looked